I broke my mother board while installing a new graphics card cooler (slipped with the screw driver) and now I have a bigger problem. My original mother board was an asus p5k-v (G33/P35 and ICH9), I would like to buy a new board with the same chipset, or one that will allow me to boot the same copy of windows that is currently on my hard drive. I do not have the time to start over, there is over a years worth of programs and other files I would not be able to save.\ The problem is that its almost impossible to find such a mother board now (with the said chipset). Do I need to get a motherboard with the exact same type of chip set for it to boot my copy of windows? Is there any way I can "fix" to copy of windows on the hard drive to boot with any motherboard? Thanks for any help.
P31/P33/P35/X38 chipset boards fortunately translate to P43/P45/X48 boards almost perfectly. You are very unlikely to have any problems if you upgrade to a P45 board. Something like a Gigabyte EP45-DS3L or Asus P5Q Pro would do fine.
thanks very much i went with the p43 (asus p5ql-pro) due to my very limited funds... however it works great and its everything i need.
Hmm, not the board I would have gone with (note I said P5Q Pro not P5QL Pro), but hopefully you should be alright. For cheaper boards I do not recommend Asus as they tend to have a very short lifespan.
The P5QL Pro is the Asus equivalent of the EP43-DS3L, whereas the P5Q pro is the Asus equivalent of the EP45-DS3L, there's little different other than that the P5QL uses the P43 chipset, which isn't a problem in itself. However, I tend to find the cheaper you go with Asus motherboards, the more likely you are to experience problems.
